The GOP is Gaslighting You on Voter Registration

I’m at a point where I’m just going to say it as bluntly as possible. The Republican party is gaslighting the American people about a restrictive voter registration bill that they’re trying to market as some common sense voter ID bill. It is far from that, and we need to talk about why.

Voter ID in and of itself is actually quite popular among most Americans. I’m personally okay with voter ID provided you actually make it accessible for people to get this identification. Maybe provide people identification when they turn 18 so you’re not putting a poll tax on people and you’re not increasing the barriers for people to vote.

But the SAVE Act, which the Republican party just passed through the House, is far from some common sense bill. Get that out of your head. It has zero to do with election security and everything to do with clinging on to power. Donald Trump’s approval rating is plummeting and the Republican party’s hopes for the future are quickly following suit.

So now they have a new plan. They’re not going to reverse course on their disastrous tariffs or their healthcare cuts, but they are going to try to rig the elections. They are trying to make it as hard as possible for young people, women, and minorities to vote by making it as difficult as possible for them to register.

The irony is that the SAVE Act actually seems to disproportionately hurt a lot of red states. When you’re going to increase barriers for people to vote in a democracy, you better have a damn good reason for it. You better be able to illustrate a compelling case that there is voter fraud you are stopping. The Republican party has not illustrated that whatsoever.

Instead, they are just removing rights and making it harder for people to vote. Look at passport ownership rates. In West Virginia, over 79 percent of people don’t have a passport. In Mississippi, it’s almost 78 percent. Under this act, you need a passport or a unique combination of documents that makes it way harder to register.

I’m a guy who runs a business and has the means to get a passport, and even I have one that’s been expired for five years because I’ve been busy with school and work. Imagine a mother of two who desperately wants to partake in democracy but is struggling on a week to week basis. This is absolutely disgusting.

We even have Governor Kristi Noem admitting the quiet part out loud. She said they want to make sure they have the right people voting. By the right people, does she mean anyone who isn’t a young person, a woman, or a minority?

This is a recurring theme. In 2016, the Supreme Court found that North Carolina Republicans were targeting Black voters with surgical precision. They requested voter data based on race, saw that Black voters used the first week of early voting, and then they eliminated that first week. They saw Black voters used student IDs, so they banned student IDs and allowed hunting licenses instead.

How much voter fraud did they stop? Zero. This is about power over groups that will remove Republicans from office. They hide it behind something most Americans support to trick you into thinking it’s about security. It’s not. It’s about making sure you can’t show up.

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